INTELLECTUAL FACULTIES OF MAN. 51. 



character, and being less essential to animal life, 

 are dealt out by nature with a more sparing and 

 partial hand. Between the two extremities of the 

 scale we find an infinite number of intermediate 

 degrees. The more exalted faculties are possessed 

 exclusively by man, and constitute the source of 

 the immense superiority he enjoys over the brute 

 creation, which so frequently excels Iiim in the 

 perfection of subordinate powers. In strength and 

 swiftness he is surpassed by many quadrupeds. 

 In vain may he wish for the power of flight 

 possessed by the numerous inhabitants of air. He 

 may envy that range of sight which enables the 

 bird to discern, from a height at which it is itself 

 invisible to our eyes, the minutest objects on the 

 surface of the earth. He may regret the dullness 

 of his own senses, when he adverts to the exquisite 

 scent of the hound, or the acute hearing of the bat. 

 While the delicate perceptions of the lower animals 

 teach them to seek the food which is salutary, and 

 avoid that which is injurious, man alone seems 

 stinted in his powers of discrimination, and is 

 compelled to gather instruction from a painful and 

 hazardous experience. But if nature has created 

 him thus apparently helpless, and denied him 

 those instincts with which she has so liberally 

 furnished the rest of her offspring, it was only to 

 confer upon him gifts of infinitely higher value. 

 While in acuteness of sense he is surpassed by 

 inferior animals, in the powers of intellect he stands 

 unrivalled. In the fidelity and tenacity with which 

 impressions are retained in his memory, in the 

 facility and strength with which they are asso- 

 ciated, in grasp of comprehension, in extent of 



